Christie vetoes lottery bills

Giving lottery winners a year of anonymity could hamper the lottery’s marketing efforts, Governor Christie said Monday, as he continued advancing his plans to privatize the lottery's sales and marketing functions.

Christie vetoed legislation that would allow winners to stay anonymous for up to one year. He also rejected a bill that would have required legislative approval for any contract allowing a private company to operate the lottery.

“Still, it’s disappointing to see Governor Christie stand so firmly against public discourse and the checks-and-balances that are the hallmark of our democracy,” Prieto, D-Secuacus, said in a statement.

The administration announced last month it would award a 15-year contract to operate the lottery’s sales and marketing functions to a joint venture called Northstar New Jersey, the only company to bid for the contract.

Democrats have complained that the Christie administration conducted the outsourcing in secret.

“This is a troubling sign for anyone who cares about free and open debate about taxpayer dollars,” state Sen. Barbara Buono, a Democrat running for governor against Christie, said in a statement Monday. “The governor often talks about being transparent, but today's veto indicates that those are mere words.”

But, in his veto message, Christie said the bill’s sponsors “misunderstand” the goal of the Treasury Department’s contract with Northstar.

“Simply put, the department’s plan is intended to modernize and maximize the potential of the lottery, and any such contract would be strictly limited to the provision of marketing and sales services,” Christie said. “The department would not, at the end of an open and transparent public procurement process, ‘privatize’ the operation of the state lottery as the bill’s sponsors suggest.”

The bill would have required legislative approval before any contract allowing a private company to operate the lottery could go into effect. It passed 45 to 29 in the Assembly and 23 to 16 in the Senate earlier this year – mostly along party lines.

Under the contract, Northstar would take over the $2.7 billion lottery’s sales and marketing functions. It agreed to pay New Jersey $120 million upfront and promised to increase lottery profits by a total of at least $1.42 billion over the life of the contract.

The company is a joint venture made up of lottery operators GTECH and Scientific Games along with the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System.

The other bill Christie vetoed would have allowed lottery winners to stay anonymous for one year. It passed unanimously in both chambers of the Legislature. Christie said restricting the state from announcing winners’ names and other information could “undermine the transparency” of the lottery and damage sales.

“The bill could have the unintended consequence of reducing Lottery sales by hampering marketing efforts and the public excitement generated when lottery winners are announced,” the governor said.

Supporters of the measure have argued it would allow lottery winners to take a breath and decide how to handle their money before entering the public eye.

Christie conditionally vetoed the bill, instead recommending a seven-month study into the effects of offering anonymity to winners.

The governor’s critics, though, say he is putting that source at risk.

“Governor Christie’s veto today is absolutely astonishing and runs afoul of any sort of oversight or check-and-balance the people of New Jersey expect from their government,” U.S. Rep. Donald Payne, Jr., D-10, said in a statement.

Payne and New Jersey’s five other Democratic members of the House asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder last month to review Christie’s privatization plan.

The bill requiring legislative approval was sponsored in the Senate by Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, D-Teaneck, and Sen. Barbara Buono, D-Middlesex, who is running for governor against Christie.

In a statement released after Christie’s veto, Weinberg said the governor has “refused to listen to legitimate criticisms and just hasn't made the case to go through with a deal that could be a loser.”